MONTREAL - OK, the HBO film is called Phil Spector. It’s about a famously eccentric record producer who has a penchant for sporting outrageous wigs and, oh yeah, who has been convicted in the 2003 death of actress Lana Clarkson.

Yet this cautionary note appears at the beginning of the film — which premieres Sunday at 9 p.m. on HBO Canada: “This is a work of fiction. It is not based on a true story. It is a drama inspired by actual persons in a trial, but it is neither an attempt to depict the actual persons, nor to comment on the trial or its outcome.”

Really? Could have fooled us. If the toupée fits … Can you say “lawyers?” Thought so.

This is a film project that has been fraught with controversy, much of which has been induced by the film’s illustrious writer/director, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Mamet.

Mamet let it slip that perhaps Spector shouldn’t be doing 19 years to life for the death of Clarkson, that evidence suggests reasonable doubt. Clarkson’s supporters, on the other hand, are outraged. And somewhere in the middle, Spector’s latest spouse, Rachelle, feels the film makes her hubby look like a “freak.” Again, if the toupée fits … If Mamet has managed to upset so many, viewers can assume one thing for certain: this biopic must hit a nerve or six. And it does.

Mamet has fashioned an intriguing drama. It is absolutely compelling. It is also endowed with two actors at the very top of their games: Oscar winners Al Pacino and Helen Mirren. They are both on fire here — and will doubtless clean up at the next Emmy Awards gala.

What’s fascinating is that the film doesn’t focus on actual events that took place at Spector’s mansion that resulted in the shooting death of Clarkson. Nor is it really set in the courtroom, either. Essentially, it is the interplay and relationship between Spector (Pacino) and his lawyer, Linda Kenney Baden (Mirren), as they prepare for the first trial while he is out on bail.

For those unaware of his background, Phil Spector, while excessively bizarre, may be the best pop-record producer of them all — as he would be the first to attest. Known for creating the “wall of sound,” Spector produced everyone from the Ronettes to the Ramones, the Teddy Bears to the Beatles. As a reminder of his producing brilliance, the pic opens with a rendering of the Righteous Brothers grope classic Unchained Melody — which went on to sell millions and may have spawned more first teen kisses than any other disc.

When she is brought into the case by lead attorney Bruce Cutler (Jeffrey Tambor), Kenney Baden is skeptical and reluctant to go too far. She’s also much under the weather. “How does it help your case that (Spector) is nuts, drunk and that he shoved a gun in (Clarkson’s) mouth?” she asks Cutler.

He responds that she probably killed herself, that she was on meds, that she was unbalanced and, most important, that there was no blood splatter on the white jacket Spector had on at the time of Clarkson’s death.

Kenney Baden is unmoved, replying that a jury will be trying Spector for the murder of “O.J.’s wife.” She also mentions a damning piece of evidence about Spector’s chauffeur allegedly having heard his boss say: “I think I just killed someone.” (Spector, for his part, denied that, saying his words were misconstrued by his Spanish-speaking chauffeur.) It is only when Kenney Baden finally meets Spector at his ornate mansion that she has a change of heart. Hard to see why, based on first impressions.

In typically flamboyant attire and wig, Spector, a veritable wall of sound himself, is rambling almost incoherently about “Abraham, Martin and John.” Turns out it is a reference to that hit Dion (DeMucci) 1968 tune about Lincoln, Luther King Jr. and Kennedy. Spector then segues into a rant about Robert and Teddy Kennedy, and how the latter got off in the drowning death of a young woman and how his sentence was “40 years in the U.S. Senate.” Then Spector adds that he probably won’t get off, that his legacy will be having killed a girl — even though he swears he’s innocent.

Spector also concedes to his attorney that he is widely regarded as a “clown” and a “freak,” and he does little to dispel those notions with Kenney Baden.

Spector speculates that he is being prosecuted because people are envious of him. He points to the white piano in his parlour where John Lennon first tinkered with the tune Imagine. And then he blurts: “Jews didn’t invent the record business. I invented the record business. Where’s my medal? I put black America in white homes!”

Spector, who is Jewish, concludes his diatribe with an assessment of Clarkson: She wanted fame, she was drugged out, she was suicidal, that she did the deed.

Remarkably, Kenney Baden is captivated by the man. She also has more than reasonable doubt about his guilt. It’s not just the blood splatter theory, but also that Spector’s hands tremble so badly that she doubts he could have placed a gun deep in Clarkson’s mouth and shot her.

“The facts don’t support a conviction,” Kenney Baden states.

No matter. The prevailing view of Spector’s law team is that a jury will convict him largely because they just don’t like him. Why? Just because he comes across as a narcissistic megalomaniac by uttering that he is being punished for “being the most successful record producer in the world, for being alive.” That, too. But after O.J. Simpson and Michael Jackson, among other celebs, got off, the feeling is that it’s a bad time for rich and famous eccentrics on trial. Nor does it help Spector’s cause that he has a history of erratic gunplay and violence against women.

Kenney Baden’s big dilemma is whether or not to put Spector on the stand in his trial. It’s not just a question of what kind of weird wig and duds he will be wearing. Rather, it’s more a question of Spector keeping his composure and not popping off with this sort of declaration: “In the old days, they would have arrested her (Clarkson) for ruining my evening.”

Small wonder that the court of public opinion had already convicted Spector before the trial.

In spite of everything, Mamet makes a case for the oddball. Which speaks to his ability to wade through the complexities of the situation and to bring such a spellbinding story to the screen.

No matter that many are aware of both the outcome of the first and the second trial (in which an ill Kenney Baden was not involved), it will not dampen viewer enthusiasm for one of the most offbeat whodunits this side of Agatha Christie — except that the ravings of Spector are beyond even the realm of the wildest fiction.

Score another coup for pay-TV. This one beats all to heck much of what is currently on display at the movie m ultiplex.

Phil Spector premieres Sunday at 9 p.m. on HBO Canada. The film then repeats Monday at 2 a.m., Wednesday at 8:15 p.m. and Thursday at 1:25 a.m.

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